THE PIE KIND. 203 



but from the bottom. At the bottom the bird 

 enters, and goes up through a funnel like a 

 chimney, till it comes to the real door of the nest, 

 which lies on one side, and only opens into this 

 funnel. 



Some birds glue their nest to the leaf of the 

 banana tree, which makes two sides of their little 

 habitation, while the other two are artificially 

 composed by their own industry. But these, and 

 all of the kind, are built with the same precau- 

 tions to guard the young against the depredations 

 of monkeys and serpents, which abound in every 

 tree. The nest hangs there, before the spoilers, 

 a tempting object, which they can only gaze 

 upon, while the bird flies in and out, without dan- 

 ger or molestation from so formidable a vicinity. 



[The Sociable Gros-beak was discovered by Mr 

 Paterson in the interior of Africa. These birds 

 live together in large societies, and their mode of 

 nidification is extremely uncommon. They build 

 in a species of mimosa which grows to an uncom- 

 mon size ; and which they seem to have selected 

 for that purpose, as well on account of its ample 

 head, and the great strength of its branches, calcu- 

 lated to admit and to support the extensive build- 

 ings which they have to erect, as for the tallness and 

 smoothness of its trunk, which their great ene- 

 mies, the serpent tribe, are unable to climb. The 

 method in whicli the nests themselves are fabri- 

 cated is highly curious. In the one described 

 by Mr Paterson there could be no less a number, 

 he says, than from eight hundred to one thousand 

 residing under the same roof. He calls it a roof, 



